US House re-elects Speaker Boehner

US House Speaker John Boehner has been re-elected to lead the chamber, despite unrest in his conservative Republican majority after this week's passage of the unpopular "fiscal cliff" deal.

The legislation, which President Barack Obama signed late Wednesday, fended off across-the-board income tax increases and postponed major spending cuts for two months. The measure allowed income taxes to rise on households earning more than $US450,000 ($A430,000) a year, a concession by conservative Republicans who argued that any tax increase could harm the still-fragile economic recovery.

After receiving a strong, bipartisan majority in the Senate, the legislation passed the House 257-167, with only 85 Republicans supporting it, while 151 Republicans voted no.

The second-ranking House Republican, Eric Cantor, considered a potential rival to Boehner, sided with the hard-line, anti-tax Republicans, voting against the fiscal cliff deal supported by the speaker.

After the vote, Boehner received a standing ovation when he entered the House chamber and walked to the podium to take the oath of office. Nancy Pelosi, leader of the Democratic minority in the House, in a bipartisan tradition, introduced Boehner, who held up a large wooden, ceremonial gavel.

Boehner pointed out that his oath, like that sworn by all Congress members, "makes no mention of party or faction or title ... only to the constitution".

"We're sent here not to be something, but to do something," he said.

Boehner said that an "anchor of debt" was weighing on the US economy and threatening to burden future generations. "We have to be willing - truly willing - to make this problem right," he said.

Boehner, who is known for weeping easily at momentous occasions, repeatedly paused and appeared choked with emotion during a short address.

The House speakership vote coincided with Thursday's swearing in of the new Congress for 2013-14, after the November elections in which the opposition Republicans remained in a slightly smaller House majority, 235-200.

In the Senate, Obama's left-leaning Democrats expanded their majority to 55-45.

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